If
you’ve paid any attention at all to the music press in,
say, the last quarter-century or so, you’ve seen Los Lobos
lathered madly in superlatives. The band—who will play a
free concert in Washington Park on Monday (Aug. 2)—got their
start in East L.A. in the late ’70s, and by the time they
broke in the middle ’80s with How Will the Wolf Survive?,their energetic and seamless incorporation of Tex-Mex,
R&B, folk, rock and traditional Spanish and Mexican
music hit professional-fanboy scribblers with the force
of a revelation. From coast to coast, critics were falling
all over themselves to praise the band, and fans attached
themselves to the group with rabid dedication (if not in
great number). If you follow the music press, though, you’ll
also know that this high praise and loyal following don’t
mean squat if it isn’t coupled with massive sales; so you
won’t be surprised to hear that Los Lobos have bounced from
label to label in search of a proper home and an understanding
and enlightened exec to shelter them.

The band’s most recent album, The Ride, and a companion
EP, Ride This, are both now available on Hollywood
Records, and we’re all hoping that the folks there know
what a good thing they’ve got on their hands. (Hollywood
Records is owned by Disney, so we’re also hoping snowballs
don’t melt in hell, but anyway . . .). For The Ride,
the band called on some old friends and heroes to add dimension
and kink to their already inclusive sound: Bobby Womack,
Little Willie G, Dave Alvin, Richard Thompson, Elvis Costello
and Tom Waits, among others, all pitch in; and on the EP,
Los Lobos express their gratitude by covering the songs
of those same, offering up their own versions of Womack’s
“More Than I Can Stand,” Alvin’s “Marie Marie,” Thompson’s
“Shoot Out the Lights,” Costello’s “Uncomplicated,” and
Waits’ “Jockey Full of Bourbon,”just to name a few
highlights. And, yes, all evidence we can gather indicates
that Los Lobos have every intention of hauling these covers
out on the road. (No word yet as to whether they’ll cover
anything by labelmate Hilary Duff, but really that’d just
be icing on the cake, wouldn’t it?)

Los Lobos will play a free show in Albany’s Washington Park
on Monday (Aug. 2) at 7:30 PM. Maria Zementauski and Alegria
will open. For more information, call (866) 333-8191.

A
Summer Place

No,
we’re not referring to the 1950s Sandra Dee flick or the
nifty Max Steiner tune that served as its theme. This is
the new exhibit at the Hyde Collection, and the full title
is A Summer Place: Lake George Photographs by Lucy Bixby.

There is a ’50s connection, however: Bixby used a 1953 Rolleiflex
camera to take these sepia-toned photos of her family home
on Lake George. According to the Hyde, Bixby “deftly captures
the architecture, family life, landscape and antique powerboats
that embody the unique atmosphere of this summer place.”

Hmm . . . we can almost hear the nostalgic opening triplets
of Steiner’s theme as we ponder Vivi’s Last Day (1997,
pictured).

A
Summer Place opens in the Hyde Collection Museum’s Rotunda
Gallery (161 Warren St., Glens Falls) on Sunday (Aug. 1),
and continues through Sept. 19. For more information, call
792-1761.

The
Nose

When
the curtain rises on Dmitri Shostakovich’s opera The
Nose, this is what happens: “A barber awakens and recognizes
the nose of his customer Kovalyov in his bread at breakfast.”

Well, how about that. That’s not the way most operas begin.
That is, unless it is a 20th-century Russian opera, composed
under the contemporary influence of such 1920s composers
as Paul Hindemith and Alban Berg, and based on a snarky
19th-century story by the wonderful absurdist Nikolai Gogol.

Needless to say, when Kovalyov discovers that his nose has
departed from his face, he is quite displeased. He is even
more unhappy to discover that the nose has acquired the
garb of someone of higher social standing and has taken
the position that “there can be no close relationship between
them.” Poor Kovalyov spends the rest of the show trying
to reacquire his errant, social-climbing proboscis.

Hard to believe, but this Bard College production of The
Nose is the opera’s “East Coast professional premiere.”
Directed by Francesca Zambello and featuring the American
Symphony Orchestra, The Nose promises to be one of
the highlights of this season’s Russian-themed Bard Summerscape.
(Other events include a terrific Russian film series and
the Bard Music Festival, Shostakovich and His World.)

The
Nose opens tomorrow (Friday, July 30) at 8 PM at Bard’s
Sosnoff Theater (Richard B. Fisher Center, Bard College,
Annandale-on-Hudson). There are additional performances
Sunday (Aug. 1) at 2 PM, and the following Friday and Saturday
(Aug. 6-7) at 8 PM. Tickets are $65, $50, $35, and can be
purchased online at summerscape.bard.edu, or by calling
(845) 758-7900.